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New Mexico is first state in US to offer universal child care

governor.state.nm.us

131–140 of 695 posts

Re: New Mexico is first state in US to offer universal child care

#131
post #12

This is fantastic! I hope they succeed and there is no abuse or other issues, because it will show how much an economy can grow when women are allowed to work to their full potential. Families who were previously in poverty because the mom would struggle to pay for childcare to work can now have assurance kids are ok while the mom can pursue jobs, start her own small business (huge chunk of businesses are small busin…

Any system, program, or social group involving tens of thousands of people is going to have issues. But if you systematize it you can work to address them rather than ignoring them in search of the perfect system (which doesn't exist).

Re: New Mexico is first state in US to offer universal child care

#133

That's wild. New Mexico is fairly notorious for having terrible medical and social safety net stuff. I have a friend that had a daughter that lived there, and had serious mental health issues, and I'd hear nightmare stories about how bad the state was for that. I have family with similar issues, in New York, and they get an amazing amount of state support.

I live in rural New Mexico and medical services are very bad here.

I took my GF to the emergency room once with chest pains (turned out to be a lung infection). After an hours long wait we got to see the "doctor". The doctor came in in street clothes which were wrinkled jeans and a frumpy polo. He was not smart and from appearance, speech and thinking patterns easily could have been the janitorial mid level manager (no disrespect meant to janitorial staff). They did a chest scan, he said he would review it, then told her to go home and take a Motrin and then she got mysterious bills for the next year from the event.

I would go to Texas which isn't far if the emergency permitted it, and in fact they do airlift most serious cases directly to Lubbock.

Re: New Mexico is first state in US to offer universal child care

#134
post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And with this option they can have that choice. Right now, many don’t.

With this option, they are now financially penalized for making that choice in order to subsidize those who don't. I'm not so sure that's a good thing.

This exact mindset of minmaxing everything is how the society stops having kids.

Re: New Mexico is first state in US to offer universal child care

#135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would make sense IMO to provide an equal value waiver to those who take care of their kid rather than send them to childcare. Stay at home moms do not provide a less valuable service than childcare providers. This policy appears to disincentives children staying with their mother even when it is preferred.

> Stay at home moms do not provide a less valuable service than childcare providers. I don't know how can anyone arrive at that conclusion. > This policy appears to disincentives children staying with their mother even when it is preferred. This assertion is baffling and far-fetched. There is only one beneficiary of this policy: families who desperately needed access to childcare but could not possibly afford it. Wit…

> With this policy, those who needed childcare but were priced out of the market will be able to access the service they needed.

And the rich parents who can afford childcare are also given a subsidy. A married parent who wants to stay home but can't quite afford it is forced to work. Is this really what you want? If it is the poor your care about why not subsidies just them?

Re: New Mexico is first state in US to offer universal child care

#136
post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would make sense IMO to provide an equal value waiver to those who take care of their kid rather than send them to childcare. Stay at home moms do not provide a less valuable service than childcare providers. This policy appears to disincentives children staying with their mother even when it is preferred.

Depending on how they structure the childcare, women who want to stay with their kids can be childcare providers at one of the centers, so they take care of not just their kids but also others. Similar to the Israeli Kibbutz system.

One of the reasons to care for your own kids is you can give them individual attention. Unless you have so many kids that you are only caring for your own anyway your plan diverts their attention away to other kids (or those other kids get less attention)

Re: New Mexico is first state in US to offer universal child care

#137
post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1. What's the market economy solution for this? 2. What if not everything in life is about the economy?

Not everything is about the economy, but someone's gotta pay for it.

Well, for the next century we'll keep pretending kids don't matter. We've done it for the past 50 years, already. Let's see how far that gets us as a species.

Re: New Mexico is first state in US to offer universal child care

#138
post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And with this option they can have that choice. Right now, many don’t.

With this option, they are now financially penalized for making that choice in order to subsidize those who don't. I'm not so sure that's a good thing.

Can you spell it out with math?

Re: New Mexico is first state in US to offer universal child care

#139

I'm going to take the reverse position. I don't like this policy. I think it would be much better to provide a one year paid stipend so that a parent can be home with the children during their tender years. This entire structure is set up to keep the boss happy while a stranger raises your child during their most formative and vulnerable years.

> This entire structure is set up to keep the boss happy while a stranger raises your child during their most formative and vulnerable years.

I can agree. I had grandparents to take are of me. During a family emergency I stayed with a friends family for a few weeks. We had a lot of people in our family and friends to step up who were all located in the same city.

Now everyone moves a thousand miles away from their existing support networks for a tech job.

Re: New Mexico is first state in US to offer universal child care

#140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would make sense IMO to provide an equal value waiver to those who take care of their kid rather than send them to childcare. Stay at home moms do not provide a less valuable service than childcare providers. This policy appears to disincentives children staying with their mother even when it is preferred.

> Would make sense IMO to provide an equal value waiver to those who take care of their kid rather than send them to childcare. This is a great way to kill a policy. It would technically be most fair if every parent was given the same amount of money per child, period. Then they could do what they needed or wanted with it. But doing so would not only increase the costs dramatically (by a multiple) it would give money…

> The more broadly you spread the money, the less benefit each person receives.

But this is true in the other direction, too. Means testing costs money, time, and ensures some needy folks fall off the program.

For example, Florida did drug testing as a condition for welfare benefits... and it cost more than they saved. https://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/18/us/no-savings-found-in-fl...

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